Monday 3 August 2009

flying toOttawa from Halifax Well, Vortex 3 has achieved two rehearsals for our two gigs tomorrow night, which included choosing the set list for the second gig: we’re almost prepared. Still to be negotiated are the questions of what keyboard instruments are available, and crucially from my point of view, who is going to tune the harpsichord(s). DG spoke to Marie Bouchard earlier (merci pour le chocolat, Marie) who revealed that she’s the only harpsichord tuner in town, but she has three gigs in two days to play herself, so tuning for everyone else understandably shouldn’t really be her top priority.  Tuning for a broadcast when you’re playing in it too is horrifically stressful (for me) – what if a string breaks? what if several strings break? what if the instrument is a heap of junk anyway? I’m not a keyboard technician by trade, I play the damn things. I can get them to sound OK, but I trust the professionals to do it properly when there are microphones and/or big audiences around, or when I’d rather simply concentrate on doing a good gig, or having a meal beforehand instead of grappling with the details of sixth-comma meantone with a wolf between G sharp and E flat, or a recalcitrant four-foot. And I certainly don’t want to be tuning when I’ve got two slightly under-rehearsed gigs to play one after the other. Our plan B is to dump the harpsichord from the second show if there’s no way of getting it in tune. It’s hard to believe that a festival on this scale can’t get harpsichords tuned for its concerts.

Tomorrow we can’t get into the venue until after 3pm as there are three different concerts there between 12 and 3. You know what, I’m going to stop writing about this as I can feel my breathing becoming shallower just thinking about it. We’ve done everything we can, and given them all the information we've got. Now I’m going to relax, stick my headphones on and listen to the Maria Kalaniemi Trio Tokyo Concert: the first 10 seconds of this record, where Maria and Timo launch gently into 'Napoleon' are just about the most comforting music I know.

When I stepped out of the front door at Moneyville, this morning there was a pipe band playing in the distance for Natal Day …

8.45pm
Cartier Place Suite Hotel, Ottawa  
Whew – just as well we checked out the venue tonight.

The spaces are fantastic: a huge deconsecrated church (really huge) with a wonderful clubby space downstairs for our late night gig.  But … the harmonium is at 436Hz and the harpsichord they wanted us to use is a charming but neglected old Rainer Schütze from 1970 which should probably be in a museum (Catherine Motuz later revealed that it was on her 'harpsichord blacklist' from some years ago). By some remarkable coincidence we walked past another harpsichord-like shape in the green room downstairs, I whipped the cover off to find a wonderful Willard Martin Flemish single, and immediately proclaimed ‘We’re using this one’ at which Carlo the production manager only just failed to conceal his disgust. Or despair or something. To be fair he’d just found out that we didn’t need the enormous Estey harmonium until the late gig, after he’d arranged for a removal team to come and move it down the stairs between shows. Sorry Carlo. After an hour or so of phone calls, we have a piano tuner coming to take the piano down to 438, I’m going to come in the morning and get the Martin down to 440 (it’s about a quarter of a semitone sharp) and Marie, many blessings upon her, is going to tune it at 6pm for the first show. Argh … I think I managed to keep my cool when I was trying to find out what the tuning arrangements were and was calmly asked ‘Don’t you tune?’ ‘Yes I do, but not for a broadcast and certainly not when I’m playing two gigs the same night.’ I didn't add 'I can work the sound desk and the lighting board as well, but I don't expect you to ask me to do that, do I?’.

Bleah. Now it’s time for dinner.

10.45pm Less grumpy now after an efficiently served Thai meal at Lemongrass. We all have our own suite with a kitchen, so we stocked up on food at Boushey’s Fruit market across the road. Having a fridge is excellent, and having a kettle is fantastic as I have a stash of nice tea bags with me, and can have some now and fill a flask tomorrow.  So the plan for the morning is to wave at each other from our balconies and then convene for homemade breakfast before our 15 hour working day. So much for having the morning free for preparation and relaxation …

the other two vortices consider cheese

happiness on tour is a stocked fridge